MORE SHEEP 
MORE WOOL 




AN ADDRESS DELIVERED BY 
ALFRED DECKER 

of Alfred Decker & Cohn, Chicago, before the 
Annual Convention of the Ohio Retail Clothiers' 
Ass'n. February Fourteen, Nineteen Seventeen 



MORE SHEEP 
MORE WOOL 





AN ADDRESS DELIVERED BY 
ALFRED DECKER 

of Alfred Decker & Cohn, Chicago, before the 
Annual Convention of the Ohio Retail Clothiers' 
Ass'n. February Fourteen, Nineteen Seventeen 



'^ 






MORE SHEEP, MORE WOOL 

AN ADDRESS DELIVERED BY ALFRED DECKER, 
OF ALFRED DECKER & COHN, CHICAGO, 
BEFORE THE ANNUAL CONVENTION OF 
THE OHIO RETAIL CLOTHIERS' ASSOCIA- 
TION, FEBRUARY 14, 1917 

This gathering, bringing together the merchants of this 
great state, is another evidence of the co-operative 
spirit prevaiHng at the present time, and saturating more 
and more the scattered business interests with the idea of 
finding and analyzing the common grounds upon which 
your business can grow and prosper. To learn from one 
another, to bring out the defects of one side of a question, 
and exult in profitably spreading over your membership 
the application of a good, or rather a better, point, is a 
cause worthy of note and a bright spot in the industry in 
which we are all engaged. It is a sign of a higher plane 
of co-operation, of unselfish devotion to our pursuits. 
Just look a step forward and think of the next generation 
in the retail clothing business. Young men who are 
today reared with the thought that associations are a part 
of our business existence, that competitors are friends 
from whom we can seek counsel and advice! This 
thought in mind makes me regret not being able lo live 
long enough to see and experience the great benefits that 
must come to the future merchants, and the expediency 
with which they will be able to handle difficult questions. 
Besides, the man}/ fundamental matters that present 
themselves, and which I am sure your body has wrestled 
with successfully since assembling here, I am venturing 



to bring before your consideration a subject of great 
importance in this critical period through which we are 
now passing. 

"More Sheep, More Wool" 

I am referring to the great shortage of the raw material 
upon which our entire industry rests, and from which it' 
is created, namely, the dearth of wool — yes, the famine 
which seems to confront us, and from which there appears 
no relief. Let us examine the physical condition of the 
wool, and thereby naturally also the sheep industry. 
It will reveal some startling figures. It will show how 
imperative it is that we clothing manufacturers and 
retailers get behind the "More Sheep, More Wool" 
campaign, for which I am pleading before you this 
evening. 

This movement was started recently and culminated 
a few days ago in a larger way in the National Sheep and 
Wool Bureau, located in Chicago. The whole idea is to 
bring about an awakening and a stirring up of everybody 
interested, from the very producer to the very consumer. 
It is contemplated to carry out a thorough campaign of 
education. The big men of the industry have evidenced 
a willingness to lend their time because they are fully 
aware of the impending crisis. The technical experts 
have assured their services. The great rank and file of 
the trade must now give this movement a helping hand. 
We are a unit on such economic questions as social uplift 
and will do all in our power to improve working condi- 
tions in factory and home. We stand virtually united in 
favor of such good measures as child labor laws, trade 
and transportation regulation, pure fabric legislation; 
we are against fraudulent advertising, etc., but right 
here is an issue that strikes the very marrow of our busi- 



ness existence. We must not, cannot, overlook it. We 
must come to its rescue, and merchant and manufacturer 
alike must lift his voice and his hand to give this propa- 
ganda an impetus. 

^. Wool is one of the few, everyday essentials that we do 
not raise here in the United States in sufficient quantity 
to meet our wants. Virtually all other raw products that 
we require for our daily use are produced in excess of our 
needs. We have lots of those to sell to other foreign 
lands. I shall not worry you long with figures, but statis- 
tics, dry as they may appear, are necessary to bring this 
evil emphatically before you. We consume in this 
country approximately five hundred and fifty to six 
hundred million pounds of wool a year. We raised last 
year two hundred and eighty-eight million pounds, which 
means that we were obliged to import about three 
hundred million pounds. These two hundred and eighty- 
eight million that we raised were produced by 48,625,000 
sheep. Now, as far as numbers are concerned, the sheep 
industry is in a sick and unhappy condition, though 
not altogether in the throes of dissolution, and there is 
hope: — if we get busy. It is now rapidly on the toboggan 
— and we must save it. Our several interests must 
integrate into a single unit. In every European nation 
there is intensive conservation of national resources. 
Only God knows how soon Uncle Sam will find it neces- 
sary to follow suit. And, gentlemen, intensive conserva- 
tion of national resources must be backed by the organized 
moral support of the people. 

Our Sheep Decreasing As Population Increases 

^ This sheep proposition looms large in the all-important 
question of national preparedness. Our population is 
increasing, our sheep are decreasing. Where in 1900 one 



million farmers kept sheep, and in 1910 three-quarters 
of a million, today, judging from good sources, there are 
only about one-half million engaged in raising wool. 
There are today thirteen million less sheep in the United 
States than in 1900. There are nominally five hundred 
million sheep in the world, producing a clip of twenty- 
eight hundred million pounds. The armies "afe' how 
consuming two billion, therefore there is left but eight 
hundred million pounds for civilian purposes. Since 
the war serious inroads have been made on this number. 
In the warring countries sheep have been slaughtered 
by the millions. It is difficult to venture a prophesy on 
what will happen after the war, but it is fair to presume 
that England will first cover her own needs, and then 
parcel out to her allies the clip of Australasia and South 
Africa. The United States will come last, and all nations 
will fight for the wool of South America, which, however, 
is more likely not to increase materially, as her best 
grazing lands are being cut up for farms and grains. 
Grain growing always comes ahead of grazing in most 
countries. 

Canvass the foreign situation and there is little promise 
for increased sheep stocks for many years. Today we are 
virtually barred out of foreign wool supplies. Now, then, 
to revert to our own country, we are growing less wool 
today than in 1885. 

Sheep Raising Today Compared with Former Years 

In seven years our clip diminished over thirty and one- 
half million. Ohio, your great state, had seven and 
three-quarter million sheep in 1860; today she has three 
million. At one time Ohio was the first sheep state in 
the Union. Seven years ago 75,000 farmers kept sheep in 
Ohio; today hardly 50,000. 

6 



Now, let us see where some of the eastern states stand. 
In 1900 Michigan had two and three-quarter milUon; 
today she has 1,800,000; Indiana had one and three- 
quarter milHon; today, one milHon; New York had one 
and three-quarter miUion, today 840,000; Pennsylvania 
slumped from one and one-half million to 850,000, and 
so all the way down. Texas has two and one-half million 
against eight million in 1883, and the state of Texas could, 
if the country were fenced, support enough sheep to 
supply the whole nation. The far western states show 
the same ratio of decrease; only two or three states 
show a slight increase. 

^-^ We are now asking ourselves this question: Should 
this country depend upon foreign lands to supply our 
necessities? Such a proposition is incompatible with the 
great program of national preparedness. There is room 
aplenty for more than 150 million sheep in the United 
States. There are many million and million acres of cut- 
over land in the North and South awaiting the golden 
hoof that enriches every good inch of ground it treads. 

Sheep Enrich the Land 

Just compare England with our situation. You can 
put that whole country in the upper and lower peninsula 
of Michigan and yet they have thirty million sheep. If 
they can raise wool profitably on land valued at from 
$500 to $2,000 per acre, why not here? Sheep have made 
England the richest agricultural nation of its size in the 
world. Without sheep, millions of acres of chalk, so- 
called barren land in England, would be useless for the 
production of farm crops. But sheep are the greatest 
fertilizer. Give the South thirty million sheep and that 
question will soon be settled. Put sheep on the worn out 



farms of New England and you will no longer see her 
sons move away. 

On January 1st the total visible supply of all kinds of 
wool in the United States was estimated at seventy- 
eight millions. Fifty-eight millions of same was domestic, 
twenty millions foreign. Considerable of that has since 
been used up. There is little likelihood of further importa- 
tion this year or next. Submarines and wool are incom- 
patible. 

Mr. Elliott, the Boston expert on wool, recently said 
that wool prices would stay in the clouds for ten years. 
I believe it. They are now predicting 40-cent cotton and 
I am told that 40-cent cotton means 75-cent wool. 

' Now, then, you will say to yourselves, "If the price of 
wool will rise, it will be profitable to raise more sheep, 
and automatically an increase of numbers will be the 
result of same." And so it will be. For supply and 
demand regulate everything. It is the great governing 
law of business. But for the very nature of the article, 
and the time it takes to make the necessary headway, the 
movement now started is to assist as much as possible 
and to urge upon everyone concerned the immediate 
attention required.. 

Your association in all states must get behind this and 
must act in a unit with the newly established bureau. 

There must ring through this country our voices for 
immediate action to stimulate and advance all steps to 
obviate this great shortage. I should feel highly repaid 
for the good of our industry at large if my word of warn- 
ing were heeded, and action taken to endorse and con- 
tribute actual assistance to this propaganda. 



The bureau will soon be in full swing for a national 
campaign. Ways and means will be devised by which 
you and others can help, and such practical suggestions 
as the bureau will make will be circulated everywhere. 
The head of one of the largest sheep owners' associations 
has been chosen temporarily to lead this cause. In a 
financial way, it is to his disadvantage to increase the 
supply of wool, for that may lessen the price he may get 
for his crop, but this man is setting aside his own interest 
for the public good. He is a broad minded man who is 
fully aware of what's what. 

His example is inspiring. Let us follow his lead and 
lend assistance to further a program that strikes at the 
very roots of our business. 



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